A known FMC Technologies juice extractor is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,649,730 to Hait, and assigned to the present assignee, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety. In this vertically arranged juice extractor, upper and lower cups support a fruit, vegetable or similar product. The sides of both upper and lower cups have fingers that interdigitate together. The upper cup descends into the lower cup against the fruit or vegetable and is pressed against a circular, lower cutter positioned at the top of a strainer tube adjacent the lower cup and an upper cutter positioned in the upper cup. Plugs are cut into the top and bottom portions of the fruit as the interdigitating fingers of the two cups mesh together. Inner portions of the fruit, such as the pulp and juice, are forced down into the strainer tube positioned within a manifold.
An orifice tube moves upward in the strainer tube and applies pressure into the internal portion of the strainer tube to separate juice and pulp within the strainer tube. Juice and juice sacks flow through holes of the strainer tube into a juice manifold. Those internal portions of the fruit having particle sizes larger than the holes in the strainer tube are forced through a discharge opening in the orifice tube and then discharged.
The juice extractor disclosed in the Hait '730 patent includes a pair of drive members, an orifice tube beam that is slidable along the drive members, and an end member carried by lower ends of the drive members. More specifically, the orifice tube beam is moveable between an upper operating position and a lower maintenance position. When in the upper operating position, the weight of the orifice tube beam is supported by hinged arms that, in turn, include lower ends carried by the end member. During operation, the force generated by the reciprocal movement of the drive members may result in fatigue and failure of the end member near the hinges. A similar juice extractor is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,780,988 to Belk et al.
Another shortcoming of this prior juice extractor is that a handle to move the orifice tube beam between lower and upper positions relies on rotation of the lower end member to thereby cause movement of the hinges. This may not give sufficient leverage to a technician.